Ankara, Berlin Bombings Trouble Tourism Industry

A bomb explosion earlier this morning in central Berlin, which killed a man in his car, and the Sunday night blast in Ankara leaving at least 37 dead and 125 wounded, has raised concerns in the tourism industry that violence may become a major hindrance to travel.

Berlin investigators have sealed off the scene of the Tuesday morning incident and are looking for more explosives after the blast in Charlottenburg at 8am local time.

Turkish security officials, meanwhile, are investigating Sunday night’s attack, which occurred at Ankara’s transit hub in Kizilay near Guven Park. Though no group has taken responsibility for the bombing, senior officials said on Monday, that they believed it was the work of Kurdish militants.

The issue of violence and political unrest was at the center of the ITB Berlin tourism fair, which came to a close last week. According to IPK World Travel Monitor, in 2015, violence and political unrest continued to affect a number of destinations across the globe, impacting significantly on their tourism sectors.

The president of tourism consultants IPK International Rolf Freitag told the ITB Berlin forum that terrorist attacks directly targeted tourists in some countries while incidents in other countries also impacted on tourism demand.

“All these factors have affected various destinations in different ways as tourists choose safer destinations. Yet there is no overall negative impact on global outbound travel and people are continuing to travel abroad more and more,” he said.